Blow Away The Cobwebs
by imsherlylocked
Summary: When something awful leaves Sherlock unable to look after himself, John has to take that responsibility. Will John be able to cope, even though his secret threatens to sabotage everything? M for a reasons, occurs later.
1. Chapter 1

Blow Away The Cobwebs

**_This might be dark and upsetting, but then get better. I wanted to use my knowledge of what happened to my nan to use. This will contain lots of Johnlock. And I mean a lot. M for a reason, WOOHOO._**

**_I do not own Sherlock or any of its characters; it all belongs to the BBC, Mark Gatiss, Steven Moffat, and Sir ACD._**

1

_John. -SH_

_John, hello? -SH_

_John, come home now. -SH_

Why? I'm busy at the moment. JW

_I need you at home.- SH_

I'm sure you can manage a few hours without me. JW

_John, I really need your help. -SH_

Oh, what could be so bloody important Sherlock? JW

_I've broken my leg. -SH_

...

"Oh god, Sherlock, how the bloody hell did you get yourself into this mess?" John was pacing the area next to the ambulance.

"Well, I didn't do this on purpose, John," Sherlock sounded irritated. "Lestrade had just text me some details about a crime that sounded particularly interesting, and as you were out and swore that you would break my phone if I shot the wall again, I got a little excited and ran out of our flat. Little did I know you had put a package at the top of the stairs."

"Hey, don't you dare blame this on me!" John retorted. "I told you that there was a package for you at the top of the stairs, I told you three times to move it or to take it in – to do _something _with it. But no, you didn't. Of course you didn't." John laughed sarcastically before shaking his head and looking at the ground.

"John, I'm just saying that if you had – "

"No, Sherlock! This is your fault, accept it! I'm not fucking clearing up for you this time. You've ruined my evening once again, and now you're blaming this whole situation on me! Well, you're on your own this time mate." John turned on the spot and walking down Baker Street, heading nowhere. He didn't want to leave Sherlock like that, but the arrogant git had annoyed him for the last time.

Sherlock stared wide eyes at John, his mouth falling open a little, trying to form words into a beautiful sentence like he is used to doing every day. But nothing came out. Only a small groan that sounded a little like "_I'm sorry, John..."_

_..._

The air was cold as John walked down street after street. His breath formed a little cloud of condensation as he breathed out heavily every now and then. He glanced around the area, checking to see if there was anything vaguely familiar to him, to try and see if he knew where he was. Nothing. Shops, cafés, pub and restaurants, a park bench with a scruffy homeless man laying on it. _Same old London _John thought to himself.

He thought about Sherlock, he thought about how he shouted in his face. How he'd left him alone, without looking back. He didn't even travel in the ambulance with him. His only friend had walked away from him, and he was only trying to explain.

_Oh, for fucks sake_, John thought to himself. He ran to the nearest road and waved over a taxi. He hopped in the back of it quickly to escape the cold.

"St Bart's Hospital, please, mate," he almost shouted to the cabbie.

Lights flashed past, occasionally being enhanced by the rain droplets that scattered the windows. Every traffic light seemed to be against him, causing each minutes to pass by agonisingly slow.

The cab pulled up outside the hospital and John threw a bunch of notes at the driver, not bothering for the change. He rushed through the doors, bumping into doctors who were trying to make their way through the busy reception.

When John made it to the desk, he almost shouted at the receptionist. "Holmes! Please," he remembered to add. The woman flicked a stand of the hair behind her shoulder and typed away on the keyboard, her brow furrowing slightly.

"He's in the ITU. Go upstairs, turn left and keep walking."

"Thanks," he started walking away, when something clicked. ITU. Intensive Care Unit. But Sherlock had only broken his leg? He stormed back up to the desk. "Sorry, um, my friend only broke his leg, what the hell is he doing in ITU?"

"I'm sorry, sir, I don't know. You'll have to ask them when you get there."

John huffed in aggravation before running to the stairs. He took them two at a time, dodging people as they appears. He burst through the doors, and turned left, all the while horrible images of Sherlock unconscious with tubes sticking out of him swam in his mind.

Still running down the corridor, he looked at the names appearing on plaques above his head; _CHRONIC PAIN UNIT, HIGH DEPENDENCY UNIT, EAR NOSE AND MOUTH CARE, INTENSIVE CARE UNIT._ John halted and stared at the door ahead of him. He made his way cautiously, adrenaline pumping throughout his body.

He squirted a fair amount of the sanitizer on his hands. He was a doctor for God's sake, he knew what to do. Ringing the bell, he stood awkwardly for a few seconds waiting for someone to answer.

"Laura speaking, how may I help you?" a chirpy voice came through the speaker.

"Ah yes, this is John Watson, I'm here to see my friend Sherlock. Sherlock Holmes."

"Of course, come right through."

John pushed on the door with a little more force that what was necessary, hurrying through and walking up to the desk.

"Where is he?" he asked impatiently.

"He's in a side room sir, just over there," the young woman pointed behind John. "You can go in in a second, but you need to put and apron and a pair of gloves on."

John spun round and grabbed a yellow apron from a tray, and well as some gloves and breathed deeply.

"Pull yourself together John," he whispered.

With a shaky breath, he pushed on the door and made his way in. He looked up and all the air from his body was exhaled immediately.

"Oh Sherlock," he said, before bursting into tears.

**_Thanks for reading, mean a lot. Review if you want!_**

**_-Sherly xo_**


	2. Chapter 2

2

**_Thank you for reading and such, I'd love it if you checked out my other stuff too! Let's see what John found then. This might get graphic, by the way, and upsetting, it's basically me recalling what I saw and went through when my nan was... dying basically._**

Tubes were everywhere. That's all John , tubes and more tubes. Some were entering Sherlock through his mouth, other's by his nose, and some were up his top.

John's eyes absorbed everything that he saw. His ears identified the slow and continuous beep in the room as the machine monitoring Sherlock's heart rate, and could see the drip by his right side, feeding Sherlock the vitamins he needed indirectly.

John couldn't stand in the room anymore, he had to get out; find out why Sherlock was in there. He pushed the door open and eased it while closing; as if he was scared the sound would awaken Sherlock or irritate him in some way.

He discarded the disgustingly coloured apron and gloves and found the nearest doctor.

"Hi, um, my name's John Watson, the man in there is my friend. Sherlock Holmes?" he still wouldn't accept the fact that Sherlock was this ill.

The doctor held up his file in his hand and flicked through a couple of pages, his eyebrows rising slightly as he found the right sheet.

"Ah, yes. Follow me, Mr Watson."

_Doctor Watson _John mentally corrected. He followed the man into what seemed like a consulting room, or a very strange office. He didn't care if he talked about this outside, he just needed answers.

"Please, take a seat," the doctor motioned towards a chair. John reluctantly sat down, growing impatient at the entire situation.

The doctor cleared his throat before continuing. "Your friend, Mr Holmes, well, there's no easy way to put this; he had a heart attack, and, as mild as it was, we had to put him on life support just to be safe.

"It seemed that there was an unknown substance already in his body, we think some kind of chemical or drug, and when we gave him some anaesthetic s for his leg and another drug to calm him, it seemed to react badly with the substance already in his body.

"He started to have a mild fit, only convulsions, but then the two or three chemicals that had reacted had somehow travelled to his heart before we could correct anything. And, as you know, he suffered a minor heart attack."

John took in a lung full of air, he hadn't breathed since the doctor started talking. John blinked a couple of times, wetting his lips with his tongue and going to speak but not knowing what to say.

"How, um, h-how long will Sherlock stay like this?" His voice broke slightly at the end of his sentence.

"We don't know for sure, but we are certain that Mr Holmes will recover. However, his brain was deprived of oxygen for approximately 6 minutes while we tried to resuscitate him. It is likely when he does come back to full waking consciousness; he will be weak and won't be able to do a lot for himself."

"I'll take care of him," John replied instantly. The doctor flashed a fake smile of approval before continuing.

"You will have to feed him, possibly help dress him, help him wash and get around, and also find ways of regaining his strength and stamina that he will have lost."

John felt as if someone had come along and decided to place a fridge on top of his head. The feeling that he was experiencing was unexplainable; like everything in the world had decided to congregate on John's shoulders.

"There is one thing, though, Dr Watson," the man continued.

John swallowed nervously and nodded, signalling for him to carry on.

"Because the brain is so fragile, and because it was starved of oxygen for 6 minutes, Mr Holmes may have lost some or all of his memory, whether it be short or long term. He may not be able to speak very well, or remember familiar faces."

John looked to the floor, cursing himself for crying in front of someone.

The doctor leaned in closer to John. "I know how hard this must be for you, Dr Watson, but I can assure you, we are doing everything we can."

John laughed slightly when the doctor finished talking and sat up from his seat. "Thank you for your time," he held out his hand and the other man took it, shaking it with more vigour than expected.

He awkwardly left the room, checking Sherlock quickly, in case some miracle had happened and he had woken up from this nightmare. He escaped the white, pristine confines of the hospital and flagged down a taxi.

...

The flat seemed so empty. The package lay ripped on the top step of the stairs, evident of where Sherlock had tripped over it. John picked it up and placed it neatly on the coffee table, before sitting down in his own chair and allowing all the emotions to finally come cascading down over him

...

_Any progress? – BLOCKED_

Yes, I managed to inject the flunitrazepam into his system before the administered the morphine. SM

_Good, that's good. Keep me updated, I want to watch the poor doctor burn. – BLOCKED_

_..._

It had been 2 weeks, 4 days, 8 hours and about 31 minutes since Sherlock had broken his leg. John had visited him every day, he brought books to read to him, flowers to made the bland room look brighter and replaced the note on his bedside in case he woke up while John wasn't there.

He was in the store buying more flowers, when his phone buzzed in his jacket pocket. He whisked it out, not affected by the wave of hope that overcame him every other time his phone vibrated.

John's grip on the flowers loosened and they fell to the ground, various petals and leaves breaking off on contact.

Sherlock had woken up.

**_GAHH it's been so long, I'm so sorry! Hope this is okay for all of you, let me know what you think and I'll update as soon as I can!_**

**_-Sherly xo_**


End file.
